Mexican Police Rescue 21 Men Forced into Labor on Rural Farm

Twenty-one men have been rescued in northern Mexico where they were enslaved and forced to work on a farm, cultivating cannabis and poppy against their will, Chihuahua Public Prosecutor’s Office said.

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Police say the men were promised employment with a daily pay of 350 pesos (US$18) at the farm in the Tarahumara mountain range. The majority of the victims are Indigenous. Four of them were reported missing in their home towns, Chihuahua and Cuauhtemoc. In total, 17 victims from municipalities in the state of Chihuahua, one from Guanajuato, one from Oaxaca, one from Coahuila and one from Zacatecas.

Several anonymous tips lead federal officials from the State Research Agency to investigate the rural area, known as “La Gallina” in Yoquivo, Ocampo.

The 21 survivors told police they were left to sleep in a cave and would rise for work at 6:00 a.m. Some men had lived there for as much as two and a half years. Their abusers were identified by their 2005 Chevrolet Silverado truck which they used to drop of food to the prisoners.